Weather in Cusco in May

Prime time. If you get to pick your dates, May is the one. Highs average 16.8 °C, lows 6.2 °C, and rain falls on 3 days — nothing in the month is working against you.

May ranks 5 of 12 in Cusco: past the worst of the year but short of August, which is the month to book if the dates are open.

Rain falls on only 3 days, so an itinerary with no wet-weather fallback is a reasonable risk. Pack for 16.8 °C days and 6.2 °C nights; the spread matters more here than any single number.

What the averages hide

The averages here are honest — no hidden extremes worth planning around. Across the twenty years measured, the hottest May day reached 22.7 °C and the coldest night fell to 0 °C.

May is moderately variable: 1 mm in the driest year against 23 mm in the wettest, around an average of 9 mm. Roughly two Mays in three land near that average, and the third does something else entirely.

Wind is light at 5.3 km/h, so the temperature on the page is close to the temperature on your skin, and humidity runs at 81%, high enough to notice on the warm days without dominating them.

How May sits in the year

Temperatures hold steady either side: 16.6 °C in April, 16.8 here, 17 in June. Nothing about the timing within the month matters much.

Daylight in May

Cusco sits close enough to the equator that daylight barely moves all year — 11.5 hours in May, against a range of just 1.6 hours across the whole calendar. Sunrise and sunset land at roughly the same time whenever you come.

An inland climate

Despite being inland, the year stays fairly even: 13.5 °C between the year's warmest afternoons and coldest nights. At 3312 m, altitude is doing as much work here as latitude: thinner air means fierce sun by day and heat that leaves the moment it sets.

How busy it gets

Busy. Popular without being frantic; book the things you care about, improvise the rest.

Crowd levels are estimated from climate desirability and school-holiday calendars, not from visitor numbers.

May in Cusco versus nearby

If Cusco is one option among several, the nearby comparison is worth making. Arequipa is a better bet in May — 8.2 °C warmer, 3 days less rain. Lima is close enough to be a coin toss — 12.8 °C warmer, 3 days less rain.

So: May is effectively as good as it gets here — 6 points behind August, which is inside the margin where the weather stops being the deciding factor and price starts being it.

Every month in Cusco

See all twelve months in Cusco, or where else to go in May.